We recently hosted the Super Bowl, which was an unbelievable experience. The Flight Crew had so many appearances in which we got to meet people from all over the world as representatives of our stadium, our team and our city.
I found myself asking the many visitors their thoughts on New York City as it is one of my favorite questions to ask any visitor I meet. While the majority say how much they love this city, many say how they could never live here.
My entire life I've been told that I'm very optimistic, perhaps at times too optimistic. However, optimism is one of my favorite traits to spread and I wouldn't change that about myself. While city living certainly is not for everyone, it's funny how much of what common visitors dislike about New York I personally thrive on.
So here are some of the things I've heard and my reasons why I love New York!
It's too expensive.
This is extremely true! However, I credit how expensive New York can be for why I have become such a hard worker. New York doesn't hand anything to you, you need to work for it! Anyone can live in a penthouse apartment overlooking Central Park if they work hard for it. The apartment I live in now was way over my budget but I decided I was going to work as hard as I could so I could one day call it home. This mentality allows no room for settling and keeps us New Yorkers climbing higher than we ever knew we could.
It's too crowded.
New York is crowded, but with people from all over the world! And if you take your headphones off on the subway, you may even find yourself in a conversation with someone from a land you've never even heard of! There are so many people with so many backgrounds to learn from.
I also can't tell you how many times I've found myself in a conversation with a stranger and realized we had some sort of connection via a mutual friend or job! True story, I once met someone who knew one of my cousins from England! While New York is crowded, it reminds us that we are all connected.
It's too big.
In my 8 years living in New York, I can say without hesitation I have not even scratched the surface on exploring this city. Did you know there are 6,374 miles of streets in NYC? That's a lot of ground to cover! This makes getting bored in New York nearly impossible. There are so many great museums, parks, Broadway shows and restaurants! In fact, if you ate at a different NYC restaurant every night of your life, it would take you 79.4 years to get through them all! But for now I'll just stick to eating at my favorite ones!
While no city or town is perfect, I think we can always find a way to see our imperfect city perfectly!
—Emma
